{"id":3518,"date":"2026-04-13T22:33:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T22:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/3518\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T22:33:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T22:33:12","slug":"were-basically-back-at-square-1-housing-advocates-urge-city-council-to-replace-blanket-rezoning-with-new-framework-for-gentle-density","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/3518\/","title":{"rendered":"‘We’re basically back at Square 1’: Housing advocates urge city council to replace blanket rezoning with new framework for gentle density"},"content":{"rendered":"

A coalition of pro-housing organizations gathered in front of city hall Monday to urge local lawmakers not to forget about Calgary\u2019s housing needs, after city council voted to repeal the blanket rezoning policy last week<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The gathering included roughly two-dozen representatives from groups that spoke favourably of blanket rezoning during the lengthy public hearing, including More Neighbours Calgary, Calgary Transit Riders, the Calgary Alliance for the Common Good and the University of Calgary Students\u2019 Union, among others.<\/p>\n

Willem Klumpenhouwer, co-founder of More Neighbours Calgary, accused Mayor Jeromy Farkas of reneging on his campaign promise last fall to replace blanket rezoning with a new framework to help promote densification<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve simply voted to go back to where we were several years ago,\u201d Klumpenhouwer said. \u201cWe\u2019re basically back at Square 1 \u2014 we\u2019ve taken one of the core pillars of the housing strategy, which had a nice green check mark next to it, and we\u2019ve put a big red X next to it. And as far as I can tell, we don\u2019t have any plan to bring that back to a green check mark.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following an eight-day public hearing that included more than 400 speakers, council voted 12-3 last week to repeal blanket rezoning. The citywide zoning policy, a component of the Home is Here housing strategy approved by the previous council, allowed homeowners to redevelop single-family detached dwellings into denser housing types, including duplexes and row houses, without first requiring a land-use change from the city.<\/p>\n

Group says repealing blanket rezoning will drive up housing costs<\/p>\n

Klumpenhouwer argued that scrapping the policy \u2014 which rezoned around 306,000 properties \u2014 will have a negative effect on housing affordability in Calgary by making it more expensive and time-consuming to develop multi-unit dwellings.<\/p>\n

While Calgary has led Canada in housing starts for the past two years and rents have started to stabilize, Klumpenhouwer said the city is still in a housing crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis didn\u2019t happen overnight,\u201d he said. \u201cThis came from this steady pace of housing getting more and more expensive, more and more scarce, with less and less variety. And because of that, people are falling more and more below being able to attain housing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat isn\u2019t going to go away if you don\u2019t add supply at both ends of the housing spectrum.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council didn\u2019t give blanket rezoning enough time to adequately judge its merits, Klumpenhouwer said.<\/p>\n

In response to Monday\u2019s rally, Farkas told reporters that council is committed to addressing housing affordability, but not solely through zoning policies. He touted the city\u2019s recent efforts to sell municipal land to non-market housing providers, as well as its new Indigenous housing program<\/a> and transit-oriented development projects.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that in the case of the blanket rezoning that it did not deliver the housing in the appropriate places at the price points that Calgarians could afford, and that\u2019s why we\u2019ve been focusing on the non-market element,\u201d said Farkas, who voted in support of the blanket rezoning repeal.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to be working in close collaboration with the provincial and federal government to ensure that non-market (housing) at the affordable and deeply affordable rates continue to be built here in Calgary.\u201d<\/p>\n

While he also voted in support of the repeal last week, Ward 4 Coun. DJ Kelly said the groups rallying on Monday are correct that council needs a replacement policy that allows for gentle densification.<\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

Ward 4 councillor DJ Kelly said there is housing that needs homeowners.<\/p>\n

Kelly noted the current population in his ward, which includes several neighbourhoods north of the Bow River, is believed to be 25,000 less than its historic peak.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe infrastructure exists there,\u201d he told reporters. \u201cWe need to bring more people back into the community in order to be able to keep our schools open and in order to be able to provide reliable transit. Those are things that you need a population density in order to be able to do, so (the advocates) are definitely right in terms of, this can\u2019t be the end.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, he mused that a replacement framework for blanket rezoning could take 12 to 18 months to formulate, considering the upcoming rollout of a new municipal development plan<\/a>, called the Calgary Plan, and a new zoning bylaw.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat (zoning bylaw) is likely the place where you\u2019re going to see more of these changes occurring,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Councillor calls for more LAPs to guide redevelopment<\/p>\n

Kelly said he wants the city to increase and accelerate its number of Local Area Plans (LAPs) to guide redevelopment across the city, and hinted that he intends to bring forward a notice of motion to that effect next month.<\/p>\n

LAPs are long-term road maps<\/a> that direct future growth, change and redevelopment in clusters of neighbouring communities. The LAPs set out various rules and guidelines, such as building scale maximums and urban form requirements based on different designations, such as whether a road is near public transit or commercial entities.<\/p>\n

City council has approved eight LAPs<\/a> so far, with another three<\/a> currently under development in Calgary\u2019s southeast and northeast quadrants.<\/p>\n

Kelly said his motion will outline the budgetary and resource requirements necessary to accelerate another three LAPs.<\/p>\n

\u201cNeighbours always should have a voice in terms of where growth occurs in their neighbourhood, where change occurs in their neighbourhood, and the Local Area Plan is the best tool the City of Calgary has in order to be able to enable that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to get to work on increasing the amount of local area planning that we\u2019re doing as a city in order to be able to codify exactly where that density belongs in our neighbourhoods.\u201d<\/p>\n

sstrasser@postmedia.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A coalition of pro-housing organizations gathered in front of city hall Monday to urge local lawmakers not to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3519,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[51,302,2201,412,1642,2200,1812,2202,1810,2199],"class_list":{"0":"post-3518","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-calgary","8":"tag-calgary","9":"tag-calgary-city-council","10":"tag-calgary-transit","11":"tag-city","12":"tag-city-council","13":"tag-housing-affordability","14":"tag-jeromy-farkas","15":"tag-klumpenhouwer","16":"tag-rezoning","17":"tag-willem-klumpenhouwer"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}